Art History (B.A.)

Art history explores how visual images, artworks, and buildings express ideas, embody values, and shape how people understand themselves and the world. By better understanding the power of art and architecture in the past and present, majors are better able to use them to create a more just and sustainable future.

Our program offers courses that address a wide range of time periods and geographic areas, with particularly rich offerings in African, European, Latin American, and Middle Eastern art and architecture. We also offer distinctive courses such as Chemistry and Art, which explores art materials and conservation, and Practicing Art History, our rigorous introduction to looking at, researching, and writing about art. Faculty offer a wide variety of approaches to the study of the visual world.  

You may also select a concentration in museum studies, which provides learning opportunities related to the work of museums, from curation and collections management to grant writing and public relations.

You will have an opportunity to apply and expand your knowledge in hands-on learning activities in classes and during internships at museums and galleries, including our own Handwerker Gallery. Our graduates go on to a variety of careers, including museum and gallery work, education, publishing, advertising, graphic design, architecture, and historic preservation.